Can you help analyse this dataset? What sample size do I need? What should we write in our Statistical Analysis Plan? Who can teach us mixed effects models? These are some of the questions we encounter as statistical consultants, providing advice and expertise to Oxford University staff and students as well as external organisations. Depending on the client, we might take the role of an additional pair of hands, a teacher, coach or communicator. So how does one become a statistical consultant? In this talk with both in-person and remote participants, Cora Mezger, Maria Christodoulou, and Mariagrazia Zottoli discussed different pathways into academic statistical consultancy and provided insights into the day-to-day of OxUSC’s work. The talk was followed by a lively discussion and presented a good opportunity for networking among local statisticians.
What does a statistician do for the England football team?
From squad selection to modelling how footballs behave at altitude, statistician Matt Penn explains how data is helping shape the modern game, and why coaches will always matter more than the numbers.
New evidence suggests vast hidden magma systems inside Mars
Researchers from the Departments of Earth Science and Statistics have found evidence that Mars once hosted enormous, Earth-like magmatic systems deep below its surface – even though the planet lacks the plate tectonics long considered essential for this kind of geological complexity. The findings open up new possibilities for how rocky planets become habitable.
Finding a needle in the genomic haystack: Targeting rare genes using statistical outliers
In statistical modelling, extreme outliers are often written off as 'noise'. But a new study by researchers from Oxford's Department of Statistics and Big Data Institute published this week in The American Journal of Human Genetics reverses that principle, using these outliers as the basis of a targeting system for locating rare, high-impact genetic mutations.